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Coolie Drivers Or Benevolent Paternalists? British Tea Planters in Assam and the Indenture Labour System*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 September 2009

RANA P. BEHAL
RANA P. BEHAL*
Affiliation:
Associate Professor, Department of History, Deshbandhu College, University of Delhi, New Delhi Email: rbehal@gmail.com
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Abstract

This paper traces the evolution of the indenture labour system in the tea plantations of Assam and, simultaneously, the shaping of the attitudes of British planters towards the labour force. Also explored are: the significant fact that only a small number of British managerial personnel were in charge of a huge migrant labour force; how the need to step up tea production for the competitive world market while keeping down costs—i.e. labour costs, being the main production cost—fostered an exploitative labour system, with planters taking frequent recourse to physical and economic coercion; and the ensuing extra-legal measures needed to keep the labour force under control. The paper also demonstrates that the colonial state was in full cognizance of the injustices of the labour system. Legislation by the government had laid the foundations of the indenture system and, while there were provisions for protecting the interests of labour force, these were on the whole ignored, with the state turning a blind eye to the planters’ use of physical and other extra-legal measures. One instance involved Chief Commissioner Henry Cotton, who attacked the injustices of the system. This attack was silenced swiftly, and the stance taken by Viceroy Curzon as the incident played out is a clear pointer to the government's willingness, to side with tea-industry interests at all costs.

Type
Research Article
Information
Modern Asian Studies , Volume 44 , Issue 1: The politics of work, family and community in India , January 2010 , pp. 29 - 51
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2009

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References

1 These ‘extra-legal’ measures included: constant surveillance of living quarters of labour, referred to as ‘coolie lines’, detention of labour without informing the district authorities, various forms of physical coercion, including flogging, etc.

2 Behal, Rana P. and Mohapatra, Prabhu P., ‘Tea and Money versus Human Life: The Rise and Fall of the Indenture System in the Assam Tea Plantations 1840–1908’ in Daniel, E. Valentine, Bernstien, Henry and Brass, Tom (eds), Plantations, Proletarians and Peasants in Colonial Asia (London: Frank Cass, 1992), pp. 142–172Google Scholar.

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6 Proceedings of the Central Legislative Council, 1901, Vol. XL, p. 139.

7 Secretary of State for India's Letter to Lord Curzon, 26 August, 1903, Letter No. 59, Curzon Papers, Microfilm, Acct. No. 1632, NAI. Original Mss Eur. F. 111/161-IOL, British Library, London (hereafter BL).

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10 For more details see Behal and Mohapatra, ‘Tea and Money’ (1992), pp. 145–150.

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14 ACP, MS 9925, Vol. 4, 18 July 1846, 13 March, and 18 July 1847, pp. 1014–1136.

15 ACP, MS 9925, Vol. 2, August 1841–July 1844, pp. 350–454.

16 Ibid., p. 112.

17 Government efforts to speed up further grants of wastelands brought about a change from the Old Assam Rule of 1854 to Fee-Simple rules in 1862 offering outright sale of land at highly concessional rates, transferable and inheritance rights. For details see Siddique, Mohammed Abu B., Evolution of Land Grants and Labour Policy of Government: The Growth of the Tea Industry in Assam 1834–1940 (New Delhi: South Asian Publishers, 1990), pp. 19–26Google Scholar.

18 Griffiths, History (1967), pp. 61–99.

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20 Papers Regarding Tea Industry in Bengal (Calcutta, 1873); Agricultural Statistics of British India, relevant years; Rana Partap Behal, ‘Some Aspects of the Growth of the Tea Plantation Labour Force and Labour Movements in Assam Valley Districts (Lakhimpur, Sibsagar and Darrang), 1900–47,’ unpublished Ph.D. Thesis. Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, 1983, p. 34.

21 Report of the Assam Labour Enquiry Committee, 1906, p. 83.

22 Behal, Rana P., ‘Power Structure, Discipline and Labour in Assam Tea Plantations Under Colonial Rule’ in Behal, Rana P. and van der Linden, Marcel (eds), India's Labouring Poor: Historical Studies c. 1600–2000 (Delhi: Foundation Books, Delhi, 2007), p. 156CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Behal, ‘Some Aspects’, Ch.1.

23 Behal and Mohapatra, ‘Tea and Money’ (1992), pp. 142–143.

24 Letters of John and Alexander Carnegie to their parents from Tezpur and other Assam tea plantations, 1865–66, Mss Eur/c/682, fifth letter, dated 17 February 1866, OIOC, BL.

25 Ibid., 4 April, 1866.

26 Government of Bengal, Report of the Commissioners Appointed to Enquire into the State and Prospects of Tea Cultivation in Assam, Cachar and Sylhet, 1868, p. 49.

27 Papers Regarding Tea Industry, p. xvi.

28 Ibid., p. XIX.

29 Commissioners’ Report, 1868, p. 44.

30 Ibid., p. 44.

31 Papers Regarding Tea Industry (1873), p. xxi.

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46 Crole, Tea (1897), p. 205.

47 Emigration ‘A’, File Nos 2–9, February 1889, NAI.

48 Emigration ‘B’, File Nos 1–3, September 1893, para 4, NAI.

49 Ibid.

50 Dowding, Tea Garden (1894), p. viii.

51 The Times, London, 2 September 1902, p. 6.

52 Griffiths, History (1967), pp. 120–129.

53 Behal and Mahapatra, ‘Tea and Money’ (1992), p. 145 and pp. 158–161

54 Griffiths, History (1967), p. 123

55 Annual Reports on Labour Immigration into Assam, Calcutta, 1880–1900.

56 Government of India, Emigration ‘A’ Proceedings, Legislative Department, 1901, p. 97, NAI.

57 Dowding, Tea Garden (1894), p. vi.

58 Hetherington, Diary (1994), 14 July 1907, p. 151.

59 Fraser, Recollections (1935), p. 40. Writing about unemployed planters he wrote, ‘at that time there were always in Calcutta in the cold weather twenty or thirty planters searching for jobs’. Failing which many ‘whacked the bottle’.

60 Revenue-A, Nos 77–117, August 1904, NAI.

61 For details see Behal and Mohapatra, ‘Tea and Money’ (1992), pp. 146–150.

62 Gait, E.A., Assam Immigration Manual (Shillong, Assam Secretariat Press, 1893), p. 2Google Scholar.

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64 A group of Santhal tribal headmen from the recruitment districts had been taken on a tour of Assam tea gardens in 1894 by the President of the Assam Branch of Indian Tea Association, J. Buckingham, for the purpose of creating a favourable impression amongst Santhals and to encourage them to migrate to Assam.

65 Emigration ‘A’, Nos 1–3, September 1894, NAI. For more details on this see Behal and Mohapatra, ‘Tea and Money’ (1992), pp. 156–157.

66 Ibid.

67 Bengal Labour Enquiry Commission Report, 1895, pp. 11–19; Emigration ‘A’, Nos 9–10, File No. 1, April 1897, NAI.

68 Government of Assam, Annual Report on Labour Immigration into Assam, 1900, p. 3.

69 Ibid., p. 8.

70 Ibid., p. 10.

71 Ibid., p. 22.

72 Emigration ‘A’, No. 6, File No. 90 of 1901, pp. 125–134, NAI.

73 Minutes by the Chief Commissioner on the letter from the Indian Tea Association regarding his report on immigrant labour in ibid., p. 170.

74 Ibid., pp. 89–112.

75 Behal, ‘Power Structure’ (2007), pp. 145–155.

76 The Report of the Indian Tea Association, 1900, p. 6.

77 The Englishman, 14 January, 11 and 23 February, and 7 March 1901; Capital, 21 February 1901; The Times in London brought out a series of articles on the subject. See also Behal, ‘Some Aspects’, Ch. IV.

78 Emigration ‘A’, Nos 6–8, File No. 90 of 1901, p. 2, NAI.

79 Ibid., p. 6.

80 The Calcutta press, including the Amrita Bazar Patrika, the Hindoo Patriot, the Bengalee and others, strongly supported Cotton's proposed wage increase. For a detailed study of the nationalist press's campaign supporting Cotton see Chandra, Bipan, The Rise and Growth of Economic Nationalism in India (New Delhi, 1966), pp. 372–375Google Scholar.

81 Curzon's letter to Secretary of State, 24 July 1901, Letter No. 50, Curzon Papers.

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83 2 Secretary of State, George Hamilton to Curzon, 15 August 1901, Letter No. 55, Curzon Papers.

84 Cotton, Memories (1911), p. 275.

85 Curzon to Cotton, 22 July 1901, Private Papers of Sir Henry John Stedman Cotton (1845–1915), MSS EUR D1202/2. Correspondence between Sir Henry Cotton and Lord Curzon, OIOC, BL.

86 Curzon's letter to Cotton, 22 July 1901, Cotton Papers.

87 Henry Cotton's letter to Lord Curzon, 2 August 1901, Cotton Papers.

88 Curzon's letter to Cotton, 11 August 1901, Cotton Papers.

89 Curzon to Secretary of State, 11 September 1901, Letter No. 62, Curzon Papers.

90 Curzon's letter to Cotton, 10 September 1901, Cotton Papers.

91 Curzon to Secretary of State, 11 September 1901, Letter No. 62, Curzon Papers.

92 Cotton, Memories (1911), p. 273.

93 Hetherington, Diary (1994), p. 150.

94 Ibid., pp. 144–146.

95 Curzon to SS, 18 February 1902, Letter No. 16, Curzon Papers.

96 Cotton, Memories (1911), p. 276.